We have unusual matinee baseball on a Monday, and even more unusual it’s a series opener – sort of — as the St. Louis Cardinals visit the Cincinnati Reds with a 1:40 ET first pitch in the NL Central matchup. I say sort of because it’s a makeup game of one rained out from May 24, and it’s the first game of a split doubleheader. Bet $5 and get $150 in bonus bets instantly when you bet on baseball at DraftKings::
I generally try to avoid picking the same club in back-to-back newsletters, and I did examine the Cards at Wrigley Field in a Friday matinee. That parlay hit at +102. But I’ll almost never ignore a standalone matinee like this one early in the week. If you’re interested in MLB betting and want to try it on the best sports betting apps, you can check out the SportsLine Projection Model for picks on games like Cardinals-Reds from the simulations and our experts.
I don’t see either club with a great chance at postseason baseball. Cincinnati certainly is not getting there, sitting five games under .500 and with a minus-86 run differential. The Reds recently got devastating news when ace Hunter Greene was ruled out not just for the rest of 2026 but likely all of next season following a second career Tommy John surgery (sadly, John himself passed on Sunday).
When healthy, Greene is as good a starting pitcher as there is in the majors, but he just can’t seem to stay that way. Frankly, I wonder if the Reds now secretly wouldn’t mind there not being a 2027 regular season due to a lockout. MLB players don’t receive their regular base salaries during a lockout, and Greene is due $15.3 million next season. That’s a lot of change for a small-market franchise to eat. Because the franchise is rather frugal, I don’t think that the job of manager Terry Francona is in any jeopardy, especially after he got the club to the Wild-Card Round last year.
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Cardinals-Reds MLB same-game parlay
- Cards win race to 3 runs
- Alt Under 11.5
DraftKings SGP price: +181
The Reds, who also have starting first baseman Spencer Steer (.238, 16 HR, 40 RBI) currently on the IL, will apparently go with some sort of bullpen game – both teams get to add a 27th pitcher for the DH – led by Chase Petty, who is the added guy for them. Petty (1-2, 4.83 ERA) has made 16 appearances in the Show this year and three starts as an opener.
He last pitched for Cincy on Aug. 7 and allowed two earned over 1.2 innings as an opener but did blank the Cards over two innings on June 25. I don’t expect him to be out there very long, and a parade of relievers will follow. I’m not touching NRFI, though.
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St. Louis is in the wild-card race, sitting 3.5 games back of the last spot, and has a 6.3% chance via the model for extra baseball. Maybe if rookie outfielder Joshua Baez is as good as he was Saturday in his big-league debut at Wrigley, then the Cards will be in the postseason. Dude homered in each of his first three MLB at-bats, a league first. When he was called up, he was leading Triple-A with 34 home runs, including four multi-homer games.
It’s probably too late for Baez to win NL Rookie of the Year, and he had a bit of a wake-call in Sunday’s win, going 0-for-5 with three Ks, but infielder teammate JJ Wetherholt is the -160 NLROY favorite, with Cincinnati slugger Sal Stewart next at +210. I think those prices should be flipped, because Wetherholt (.245, 16 HR, 46 RBI) is not having as good a season at the plate as Stewart (.259, team-leading 26 HR and 91 RBI), but it’s also not all about offense.
Lefty Quinn Matthews, the Cardinals’ No. 8 overall prospect and the 27th added guy for St. Louis, gets the call and he should actually be a starter and not an opener. The 25-year-old has made just one big-league appearance — on Aug. 1, when he allowed two runs over five in a loss in Toronto. Matthews has been quite good in the minors this year with a 3.27 ERA and 1.23 WHIP in 21 starts.
President of baseball operations Chaim Bloom recently mentioned that Mathews figures into the club’s rotation plans and will help with workload management for the remainder of the 2026 season. So maybe his time in the minors is finished unless the Cards send him back down until rosters are expanded for good in September.
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I liked this matchup a lot better yesterday when the projected Game 1 starters were ace Andre Pallante of the Cards and Rhett Lowder of the Reds (very good at home) as I had a better idea what to expect from them. But they will go in Game 2. Ideally for this total play, a key lineup guy or two on each side sits in the opener. And at least the Reds haven’t seen Matthews. Check out other expert picks in the SportsLine daily newsletter.
